Ukrainian nuclear power state-owned operator Energoatom said a russian missile flew “critically low” over the South Ukraine Nuclear Power Plant on Sunday morning.
Even symbolic support is not meaningless; with every such gesture you are preventing the claim that no one cares, no one opposes, no one disagrees, no one minds.
it’s about the gesture. it’s about right or wrong, about freedom.
“Who can prevent all this from happening? The people. Public figures, journalists, musicians, actors, athletes, scientists, doctors, bloggers, stand-ups, Tiktokers, and more. Ordinary people. Ordinary, simple people. Men, women, old, young, fathers, and most importantly - mothers. I know that my speech will not be aired on Russian television. But the citizens of Russia have to see it. They need to know the truth.”
There is only one side to be on.
Zelenskyy shows bravery and leadership that haven’t been seen for a long time.
This just shows that the world hasn’t learned anything from WW2. Those who sit idly by will be judged by history.
Pay attention when people move the goalposts. First, Ukraine is full of Nazis. Then suddenly all war is bad. Then suddenly sending financial aid to a country at war is bad. Notice how the initial claim is just gone now? If you get debunked on your biggest fucking claim in a debate, you better take a step back and think about it.
And then pretends it’s akshually just a pivot from “Ukraine is full of Nazis, it’s not our war and we shouldn’t send billions in aid and weapons to other countries because we gotta play world police”?
Now that we are talking about sending missiles and soldiers too, is he going to admit that he’s a fucking clown? Hell naw! The Ukrainians are doing super good but also need 40 burgillion dollars and tomahawk missiles and we gotta
bring democracy to Iraq
bring women’s rights to Afghanistan
find WMDs
“Save Grenada from independence” (The Nutmeg!!)
“Liberate Somalia”
“Stop Iran from making nukes”
protect freedom in Ukraine!
There’s no pivot, he’s just bewildered by ideological consistency because he doesn’t understand it. Turns out that when you’re anti war on principle you’re also against arming far right Nationalist regimes who rape and murder and torture their own citizens AND you’re against sending them money and guns, WEIRD! Being firmly against American interventionism used to be something the left claimed to champion.
People like this talking about “moving the goalposts”, pfffffffffff. Fucking liberal warhawks lining up to fund neo-Nazi regimes, amazing. Running interference for far right, White supremacist nationalists to own the anti-war folks, based!
it’s this bizarre media induced panic that has people assuming that if you don’t think Putin’s invasion was just some evil imperialist plan to expand Russia and want to actually look at the history of what led up to that conflict, then it’s tantamount to endorsing his actions.
newsflash: it isn’t.
acknowledging that the US and Ukraine have dirty hands in this doesn’t mean Putin is justified in invading. he never was and nobody in the anti-war camp ever argued that he was. but if we want it to stop his aggression, then plugging our ears when we want to explain the origins of the conflict and going “la la la la Russian disinformation just send bombs and guns to the Nazis” isn’t going to help the Ukrainian people.
I don’t have a problem with you disagreeing on the history or being anti-war. Hell, I’m not exactly pro-war myself. I’m mostly concerned with the active spread of Russian misinformation. I’m cool with you guys having your own opinions. I just want it to be based on what is actually happening and not some silly “Ukraine is full of Nazis” bullshit that we know is false.
so Ukraine doesn’t have Nazis, specifically in influential circles both in Parliament and the national guard? you know that to be false?
let’s stop with word games ok. “full of nazis” is hyperbolic. as would “Ukraine has no nazis”
there are paramilitary factions subsumed into aspects of the Ukrainian defense force, including the national guard. the Svoboda party, the Sich Battalion, C14, Azov Battalion, etc have helped carry out specific things, like the coup in 2014 and the bombing of the Donbass for 8 years, with support of the US and if we want to send them arms, invariably they will end up in the militant nazi-aligned wings and their influential members.
you know that to be false?
I love the people in the notes of this post that insist the 2014 coup was just the good ol’ democratic process at work. never mind that John McCain is with the “protesters”, telling CNN “We’re here to bring about a […] transition.” don’t worry! he said “peaceful transition”!
he was there to defend peace and independence, don’t you know! John “Bomb Iran” McCain was just there to support a peaceful protest and protect the valiant interests of the Ukrainian people to protest!
I mean, he’s standing there with Oleh Tyahnybok, leader of the Ukrainian nationalist Svoboda party, who went on to form the Sich battalion and C14, but that doesn’t mean anything right? just take him at his word that he’s there to support democracy and peace. he’s only one of the most notorious warmongers in history so obviously he’s telling the truth about the innocence of his intentions. He was only agitating congress to send them weapons, but it’s totally not a US puppet coup. Believe John McCain because he tells the truth.
The founder of the Svoboda party was appointed as the Secretary of Security and National Defense Committee, but no the Nazis have no influence! only one parliamentary seat, don’t you know!
it’s not some wild conspiracy that the United States funds extremist factions to carry out coups and protect its interests. they did it with the Mujahedeen in the 80s which saw the rise of Al Qaeda. they’ve done it tons of times since. did it in Ecuador. regime change has been carried out dozens of times and it’s never been good for the people living there.
and when you have C14 (which was named after the 14 words) leaders openly declaring that they were instrumental in the regime change because their willingness to escalate to violence and “perform the tasks set by the west” then the connection between US influence and the Maidan protests isn’t so wild.
what is it about C14, Azov, Sich, the bombing of the Donbass for 8 years, and John McCain’s appearance amongst the Maidan protesters in 2014 do we have so wrong?
if it’s Russian disinformation, then why were Azov’s neo-nazi ties being reported about on the Time, BBC, and NBC before 2022 came around? why did Congress ban funding to them because of their extremist ties in 2017? there’s plenty of non-western and independent sources that reported on the nazi influences in Ukraine prior to this conflict.
falling back on “that’s just what Russia says!” is not an answer. we’re not excusing Russia’s actions and never were. we’re explaining that their motives didn’t just fall from the sky. We can’t change what Russia’s doing, but we have to honest about the role of the West in all this because that’s where we’re from. they can’t use excuses that we don’t hand to them on a silver platter.
when meddling and warmongering got us into this, then it’s not inconsistent to then advocate against more meddling and warmongering. simple as.
the painting of the situation as “Russia started this all and NATO is just innocently protecting the peaceful people of eastern Europe” is what’s bullshit.
Russia did invade, but history didn’t start at that moment. Russia escalated but the seeds of the conflict were there and ignoring them helps no one. Sending arms so that Russia can be driven back only to help entrench white nationalists who enjoy torture and killing (their words) does not help the people of Ukraine.
Svoboda has 1 out of 450 seats in parliament. The Sich Battalion has around 50 members, S14 has disbanded, and the Azov Battalion is estimated to have 900-2500 members (of which only 10-20% are estimated to be Nazis). Even if we grant that all 2550 of those soldiers are full-blown Nazis, that is only 1% of their 246445 soldiers in their full military. The real percentage could be as low as 0.05%.
I don’t know why you made this huge post talking about Ukraine’s history. I guess you assumed I would reject it all? The thing is, Ukraine is in a much different position than we are in the west. You would expect to have a much more nationalistic mindset in a nation that is constantly struggling against a much larger nation that has pretty clear intent to annex your country.
If your point was that they have Nazis or that their recent history has a lot more ultra-nationalism than you’d expect, there are two problems with that. One being the situation I described in the previous paragraph, the other being that… actually, their levels of far right support are probably less than what I’d expect for a nation in their extreme circumstances.
Pay attention when people move the goalposts. First, Ukraine is full of Nazis. Then suddenly all war is bad. Then suddenly sending financial aid to a country at war is bad. Notice how the initial claim is just gone now? If you get debunked on your biggest fucking claim in a debate, you better take a step back and think about it.
And then pretends it’s akshually just a pivot from “Ukraine is full of Nazis, it’s not our war and we shouldn’t send billions in aid and weapons to other countries because we gotta play world police”?
Now that we are talking about sending missiles and soldiers too, is he going to admit that he’s a fucking clown? Hell naw! The Ukrainians are doing super good but also need 40 burgillion dollars and tomahawk missiles and we gotta
bring democracy to Iraq
bring women’s rights to Afghanistan
find WMDs
“Save Grenada from independence” (The Nutmeg!!)
“Liberate Somalia”
“Stop Iran from making nukes”
protect freedom in Ukraine!
There’s no pivot, he’s just bewildered by ideological consistency because he doesn’t understand it. Turns out that when you’re anti war on principle you’re also against arming far right Nationalist regimes who rape and murder and torture their own citizens AND you’re against sending them money and guns, WEIRD! Being firmly against American interventionism used to be something the left claimed to champion.
People like this talking about “moving the goalposts”, pfffffffffff. Fucking liberal warhawks lining up to fund neo-Nazi regimes, amazing. Running interference for far right, White supremacist nationalists to own the anti-war folks, based!
Ooh I’m deboonkin
Laugh it up, but this loser gets banned every week and then uses it to get around all the blocks people have against him before pre-blocking them so they can’t respond. He has done this to me multiple times now and I’ve barely been back for a few months.
His evidence of Ukraine being full of Nazis is like one article and some speeches. I’m glad he is just taking the word of a former Neo-Nazi gang leader over everyone else. Genius move.
I never advocated for sending soldiers and I’m still not going to. So he can fuck off with that shit too.
If you actually look into the so-called Nazi problem in Ukraine, you’ll find that it’s not a huge problem anymore. Far right political parties get next to 0 support and the Azov Battalion is not only tiny, but not even strictly a far right militia anymore.
Let’s not even forget that Russia is one of America’s top 2 enemies and that they are invading Ukraine without justification, even if you do think we shouldn’t be defending Ukraine. Hominis is a fucking Russian shill at this point. He’s just another broken, braindead, empty shell that will be used as a mouthpiece for right wing thinktanks while mistakenly believing he’s a free thinker.
OP is right though and hominis is spouting RT propaganda that justifies the invasion.
There are Nazis in Ukraine
There are far more Nazis in Russia, including Putin himself who’s favorite philosopher was a fan of Mussolini.
Oh I have no doubt. I personally am of the opinion that there are no good guys in this conflict. Just different warlords fucking with civilian lives.
My sympathies. But America has its own problems at the moment
Ukraine is not a country without its flaws, but it’s a country with a functioning democracy squarely in the path of progress and further Westernization.
Russia is a dangerous unhinged regime lead by a complete lunatic who stokes the fires of Soviet nostalgia to justify bombing cities to dust.
Zelensky came into power in a normal election, defeating the revolutionary candidate Poroshenko and was called a weak sissy who was too soft on Kremlin for several years. He is very far from a warlord.
And all of this only happened because Europe is addicted to Russian fossil fuels.
Also isn’t Ukraine more of a parliamentary system than a pure democracy? They’re at least a republic.
Yeah, and you know how many seats out of the 450 the far-right parties hold?
One.
Oh I’m not saying it’s run by Nazis if it’s not a democracy, I was just curious. Keep in mind nobody in America really even knew about Ukraine until it started showing up on the news
That’s fair, but it’s also the reason why the nazi accusations are so frustrating. They’re mostly based off of 2013-2014 Russian state propaganda that tried to paint the Ukraine revolution in a negative light to justify the subsequent annexation of Crimea.
Yeah, the Azov battalion is a thing, but they don’t hold any kind of political power, just a bunch of bad people fighting to defend their homeland.
I’m not going to start explaining how nationalism is much more complex in previously-occupied countries and we’ll just assume all nationalists are Nazis.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine is unjustifiable and the brainchild of a horrible leader who’s using it to buffer his support.
The invasion of Ukraine is utilized by Western leaders to rule up normies and political drones to boost their influence.
Both of these can be true at once.
Financial aid to Ukraine is a good idea
We need to scrutinize foreign aid and temper how much we actually hand out in a time where many Americans are suffering financially.
Both of these can be true at once.
Not everything is the plot of the Bad People. History is governed by an uncountable number of variables. There are plots by evil men, but also uncontrollable forces such as population growth, climate, cultural turns, etc.. We can’t allow one mode of interpretation to dominate our thoughts. We have to be skeptical of every narrative and our own biases, because no one narrative is ever capable of encompassing the whole truth.
Jesus, thank you for the best take on this entire post.
TLDR: Russia is invading Ukraine, and America looked at this conflict and saw an opportunity to misuse it to their own advantage.
Is it purely to America’s advantage, or the world’s?
The United States has been a check for Russia and the USSR since the USSR was founded and Nazi Germany was felled. It has been the longstanding interest of the US to check the USSR and Russia’s aggression and Marxist-Colonialist influence- and lets not mix words, the USSR was a happy colonial power, it just did it with evangelizing for Marxist Communism the way any missionaries bullied their way into Africa, the Indian subcontinent and the rest of East Asia.
Opposing them has been messy, especially given the USSR and then Russia’s penchant for cultural warfare and social manipulation, often to where people were seeing gremlins and shadows of CIA espionage where there were none, or even seeing CIA where it was Russian intervention to sabotage smaller developing nations.
The alleged use of Ukraine to stir normies to political causes is kind of overblown by the sheer MAGNITUDE of just what a big important quicktime event and blunder this is on the part of Russia and I cannot fucking emphasize this enough. Russia’s strategy of control has been to become the cheapest and most accessible form of energy to Europe, infiltrate Europe’s social culture with sympathetic shills that go to bat for Russia by instigating and sabotaging attempts to wean away from Russian gas and oil, and sew chaos to keep them in a status quo for domination.
Russia is very keen on doing this and has the art of doing this shit down to a fucking science.
And in the US we dealt with shills going, “All war is bad so we should stop butting heads with the Soviet Union while it infiltrates and sabotages more of Africa, Asia and South America. If those countries all just suddenly start joining the Red Army, that’s their choice. :^)” all throughout the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s.
The USSR’s meat and milk was petro and gas exports. And how do you assure those assets keep flowing? Keep other countries on the teat. Sabotage nuclear initiatives by writing anti-nuclear social movements into countries’ Bleating Progressive Machine, so they associate domestic and civilian nuclear power with militarism and war and the CIA. Destroy what someone has and any attempts at getting something on a higher branch so they’re forced to eat out of the palm of your hand or starve, if they have anything at all.
China took pages out of that playbook. And you know how they’re treating Venesuela right now? Venesuela is selling China its oil at a loss because of contracts and aggressively fierce delegation from China for loans it desperately needed, and was subsequently sharked for, which results in lower payments for its natural resources, which results in debt, etc. Until for all intents and purposes China has a satellite state in South America. And that is not much different from how the USSR/Russia was operating, back in the day. And then running social interference stateside to make the progressive conversation all about plutocratic American and western capitalist corporations wanting 3rd world blood and oil all to themselves because they’re, “imperialists.”
With Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, we have an opportunity to put the bear’s nuts in a position where they can be battered and weakened for the next 30 god damned years. Sanctioning them over a war that they started, and keeping them locked in a tiny room with a very angry, now progressively more well armed adversary that was a fraction of their size. The amount of losses they’ve suffered and subsequently now have to replace goes up, every day. The amount of manpower lost constitutes decades of people that won’t be there on the battlefields for the next European country with rich fossil fuel reserves Russia decides belongs to them.
And with the lend-lease to a petrol and natural gas rich country like Ukraine, whatever aid we give them today will return to us at a profit tomorrow. So doing the right thing AND it being an investment? Hot god dang jolly. Yes. I’m game.
A Nine Inch Nails poster promoting the Kiev show in June just happens to be in the middle of protesters and police forces in Kiev today. Somehow this is coincidence and not a new Year Zero ARG. Stay safe out there, Ukrainians.
I know it’s not much, I would like to do a lot more, but I’m very grateful to the fate, that in such situations quite large following is an useful weapon.
Слава Україні! ✊
Today is the last day to purchase last 15 copies ♥️ Consider buying my Partner’s Charity prints as well:
Фенріс-бандурист. Підримую українську хвилю творчості. Освоюю потроху Procreate, скетчу і надіюся завершити цю роботу також в Procreate, шоб пощупати можливості програми, бо поки шо мені подобається)
Fenris playing Bandura, ukrainian traditional instrument. On a wave of the Ukrainian culture <3
It was quiet here last month or so. I wasn’t posting or creating anything. And the reason of this is WAR.
Don’t recall that I ever mentioned here that I’m an artist from Ukraine, living in Lviv right now. If you don’t live on the bottom of the ocean you certainly know that Russia invaded Ukraine right now and we’re in open war now. Of course, the conflict is not new, Russia occupied a lot our our land in 2014 and the war on the Eastern part of Ukraine was ever since. But now it’s a full scale invasion, they’re not hiding behind “it’s not our troops” phrases. They bombing our cities with missiles, artillery and a lot of stuff I don’t even know or understand.
The one thing that I know right now is that I’m not safe in my country anymore. Despite living really far away from Russian (and Belarus) borders, missiles are hitting Lviv as well. It’s 70km from Poland border, btw. It’s really scary to hear an explosion. But a lot more terrifying is to feel it, with your body…
These 39 days felt like years, especially first two weeks. Living in constant fear for your loved ones and yourself, afraid to sleep, not wanting to eat, packing your emergency backpack, shivering from every loud noise on the street. Someone closed a car door too loud? Tram passing by? You neighbour dropped something heavy on the floor? Congratulations, now your heart is beating fast and you’re scared af.
I have friends that escaped really hot spots of this war. They were sleeping in the basement while neighbouring houses being shelled by artillery and air bombs. They miraculously escaped this hell, came to my relatively quiet place. I never forget their eyes of fear every time they hear trams. I had to quiet them down literally every 5 minutes, because they thought that it was a sound of bombs.
Not to mention air alerts/sirens every day. We got used to it. Got used to doing to the bomb shelter couple times a day. Even in the middle of the night. Being wakened by the howling sirens almost every night at 3 am or 4 am is stressing itself. Feels like a torture when prisoners are deprived of sleep. But you need to wake up and go to the bomb shelter, because you never know when it’s your house being targeted.
But the thing that urged me to share my thoughts with you was the one that happen in Bucha near Kyiv.
Kyiv is the capital of Ukraine with more than 4 mil people living there. Bucha is a suburb of Kyiv, some 20 km away. It was a prosperous small city. There were a lot of families with small children, a lot of youth, many of my friend lived there. All of them are IT specialists, programmers, artists, musicians etc. This city (as long with many neighbouring cities) were captured by russians in the first days of war, I guess, in attempt to capture Kyiv itself. But Kyiv did not surrender and these suburbs were under the russian control for over a month. A few days ago they started to withdraw troops from Kyiv suburbs and we saw what they did there. With people. Hundreds of people murdered, tortured, raped.
Russian president claimed that we have nazis here, so we have to be denazified. But in reality they just shoot ukrainian people for being ukrainians.
Russian propaganda for years poisoned minds of people, not only russians, but people in west too. Let me assure you that we don’t have more nazis than any other country. (In reality, our far-right never did it to parliament on any other significant government structure. And The Azov battalion, of which every pro-russians speak, no more than a good soldiers who volunteered to go to war in 2014 because our military was in ruins. As the Azov battalion grew, the denounced their nationalist believes and everything that is left in their ideology is to protect Ukraine from Russian invaders.)
With this being said, it is sickening to see everything that happened on the territories being occupied by russia. Marauders (russian soldiers) were stealing stuff from apartments and houses ukrainians left when fleeing the war. Russians were killing for fun. Not only men. A lot of women and children are dead too. Elderly people were shot on the streets when going out to the grocery store. Cars of people, who wanted to evacuate, were shoot from tanks. These cars had KIDS written everywhere on them. But russian soldiers read it. And they shot anyway. Reading stories from my friends and colleagues are terrifying and unimaginable. And yet it happened, with people I knew, with their families. My colleague lost her sister, who tried to escape occupied city in the car. My friend lost an entire family he were friends with. Mom, dad and a child. All dead, in the middle of the street.
To be honest I’m afraid to look at the photos that are published right now. I’m scared that I might see a familiar face of a friend that I drank a beer with, or of a colleague I worked with…
When I read articles and messages “not all russians”, “it’s Putin war” I want to scream in rage. Was it Putin who shot people in Bucha? Was it Putin who dropped bombs on the hospitals, schools and houses? Was it Putin who raped women and children? These soldiers could disobey orders, could just go home and refuse to take part in all these madness. And yet they stayed. They did everything they were told even when they knew they’re killing unarmed civilians.
And there are people of russia who support this. Don’t be fooled by some of them who say “no to war”. They lived all their lives watching Putin causing one war after another (Chechnya, Georgia, Syria, Ukraine) and did nothing. How could it be that there are more people protesting against the war in Czech Republic and Austria than in Russia itself? You could say that people are scared, of course they are. But how could you change anything without stating your mind? I saw some protests in moscow and st.petersburg. But do you honestly thinking that a 5,000 people protest in multi-million city goes with the phrase “not all russians’? It proves exact opposite, it shows that 80+% approval of this war amongst society is absolutely true.
Russians hate everyone, not only Ukrainians. Russia has a deep history of colonisation no one ever speaks of. Why do you think russian territory is so big? It got it from all the nations it colonised and destroyed. And russia never acknowledged what it did to other nations, wiping out their languages and history.
With all being said… I just want you to keep in mind that war is a cruel and an absolute evil that can’t be excused by anything.
I don’t believe in any god, so I won’t tell you to pray for us. I would ask you so speak for us!
If you are against the war, say it! If you want to help, do it!
If you think about us, thank you from all my heart!
First of all, to remind (or tell) you who I am and where I’m from.
I am Ukrainian, and I lived in Ukraine, Odessa my whole life. Until early March or 2022 when I had to flee my home because of war.
Since then my life has been a whirlwind. To sum it all up briefly – me, my mother, my grandma who is 82, and our dog fled to Romania, moved multiple times traveling through the country with the help of the kindest locals, and after another month and making good good friends on the way who helped us on the level I’m still struggling to comprehend I was finally sure the situation for my family is stable.
The hospitality of Romanian people is also the reason for this post to have exactly this one art piece.
And because Romania is beautiful too.
Should I tell you I dreamt about seeing mountains? It came to life. But I hate the circumstances of this dream coming true. I can only wish to come back to Romanian Carpathians while not running from war.
Why “to come back” would you ask? Because after that month I moved further, but on my own. To France.
Yet worry not, I’m not alone here! (Though I’d still appreciate help from locals in terms of information and such. Please feel free to message me if you can spare a minute or two to talk about daily life )
What am I up to now? Looking for an on-site job in Paris as a game artist. Taking in freelance offers in the meantime (giving preference to commercial). If by chance you can help with my job search – you know what to do my DMs are open.
If you want to support me – my paon and other ways to help/donate are linked in bio. I have to warn I can’t promise any constant updates of my content though.
I of course want to thank the people who helped me through all the way♥️ Both with advice and donations they (you all, when you read this!) supported me immensely, literally keeping me going. You are the most amazing human beings, I’m grateful to you eternally, and I’m still astonished by how many you are.
I could have said much more, but for now it is what it is. Thank you for sparing a minute to read.
Small addition – I now have a life profile with pictures on Instagram – @joycetakespics. If you want, you can stop by and look at my yet-to-be magnificent collection of flower pics.
Another important part.
You might think I’ve come through a lot, but I’m in fact incredibly lucky compared to way too many other people in Ukraine.
⁉️What you can do to help not only me, but my people⁉️
First of all: Spread the information you see about war. Keep talking about it.
Both luckily and unfortunately we live at the times when awareness in social media is the greatest weapon, and the lack of it – even more so. It’s the part where you choose sides.
Secondly, donate.
There are hundreds of ways, destinations and options. Don’t ignore it if you have a coin to spare. There are reasons people ask for help, there always are.
If you won’t mind a hand at figuring out where to donate, I’ll try to share smaller Odessa volunteer accounts on insta stories (or twitter) when I can.
Sorry to be an ugly fun-killer but in light of the recent Invasion I urge you all to be mindful of the things you reblog and the memes that you repost. Please remember that behind every “world war 3 lmao” post there is a reality where real people are going to be displaced from their homes and are going to lose their lives.
Before you laugh at that tweet that talks about the draft or whatever ask yourself: are you laughing because it’s funny? or are you laughing because you’re safe and comfortable in the West and it’s not a direct problem for you?
